Tom Molloy

Biography

Tom Molloy produces drawings, sculptures, and installations, whose economy and delicacy belie the darkness of their subject matter, which is centered upon the human cost of geo-politics. With America as an enduring focus, he unflinchingly examines the destructive toll of political and economic ideologies, ranging from fascism to capitalism; wars, from WWII to America’s war in Iraq; and mass media culture. Literature, maps, money, stamps, and famous figures from history and art history recur throughout his work, often heavily redacted. “A lot of my work is about evidence,” he explains, “about examining sources, examining things which you take for granted in the real world, whether they’re photographs, or texts, or stamps, or whatever.” Through his simple, pointed manipulations of these sources—folding dollar bills into fighter jets, for example—Molloy transforms them into politically charged objects that yield darker underlying truths.